Moving on, here are the news that shocked the world…

Government Shutdown $SPX ( ▲ 0.01% ) : Trump did it. Or rather all the politicians did. Government shutdown is here and they all can’t agree on how much debt to take on. [Read More] 🙃 

Pfizer $PFE ( ▲ 1.07% )  : Pfizer has agreed to lower its drug prices in the U.S. in a deal with Trump in exchange for tariff relief and investing in the U.S. [Read More]

Amazon X Hertz $HTZ ( ▼ 6.3% )  $AMZN ( ▼ 1.3% )  : Amazon is collaborating with Hertz to directly sell cars to consumers. Hertz provides the cars, Amazon provides the platform. [Read More]

OpenAI Instant Checkout $ETSY ( ▼ 0.22% )  $SHOP ( ▲ 6.5% )  : Etsy and Shopify’s share price rose as OpenAI announced the Instant Checkout feature that allows users to buy products from ChatGPT [Read More]

Electronic Arts $EA ( ▼ 0.15% )  : Electronic Arts is being brought private in a US$55 billion deal by an investor group including Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund [Read More]

Here are the news covering the Asia market…

BYD $BYDDF ( ▼ 3.81% )  : BYD’s monthly sales declined by 6% for September 2025 - first-ever decline in 2025 - as the price war in China intensifies and eats into everyone’s margins [Read More]

Soon Hock: Soon Hock, an industrial property developer has filed for a listing on the Singapore Exchange. The issuance will fund the purchase of more land for development [Read More]

Coliwoo: Another one! Coliwoo, a co-living company has also filed for a listing on the Singapore Exchange. The issuance will help expand its co-living business. [Read More]

Leong Guan: Leong Guan is also listing. The foodstuff maker is planning to list on the Singapore Exchange. [Read More]

Raffles Medical Group: Woo Yeng Yeng will be joining Raffes Medical Group as its Chief Financial Officer. She was from Paragon REIT where she was also the CFO. [Read More]

See below for our handpicked analyst reports:

How do you measure whether a company is generating its revenue efficiently?

One metric stand out - Revenue per employee.

What is it?

To put it broadly, it is the total revenue of a company divided by how many employees it has.

For example, if company A has 100 employees and generated SG$10 million, then the revenue per employee is SG$100,000.

How is it useful?

It enables investors to determine whether a company is being productive and efficient at using its labour force to generate revenue.

• A low revenue per employee shows that the company might be hiring too many.

• A high revenue per employee shows that it is being efficient at doing so.

However, this is just one way of looking at this.

There are companies which have low revenue per employee but actually generate high profits. They could be food & beverage companies that prioritises the service to a customer.

There are also companies with high revenue per employee but with thin profit margins. Think of companies which doesn’t employ much employees but spend a big amount of money on their machineries and equipment.

Build Your Dream (BYD) is becoming something like a meme this month.

The Chinese EV player has seen its share price drop by 16.3% from its peak of HKD130.90 in May 2025.

China’s EV industry is going through a turning point.

• Price wars are eroding profit margins of every EV player

• It is a battle to the bottom

And BYD is not spared from this also.

Its September sales showed that not all is well with a 6.3% decline in sales - the first-every time it happened in 2025.

Its latest profit in 2Q 2025 also declined by 32%.

Profit margin which is already thin in the past couple of years, have declined even further to 3.1% in 2Q 2025.

• Historically, in 2023 and 2024, BYD achieved about 5.0% margin.

It is unclear whether the current price war in the EV industry would calm down. The Chinese authorities have already sound the alarm bells warning Chinese companies to stop initiating price cuts and wars.

However, it does present an interesting opportunity.

• BYD is currently trading at a price-to-earnings ratio of 24 times, lower than its historical average of 95 times.

Investors are probably circling around now to see how much further it would fall.

Hope the above is fruitful for you all..

Cheers,
James Yeo